PLAYBOY: You disagree with Neil Young's lyric in "Rust Never Sleeps": "It's better to burn out than to fade away..."
LENNON: I hate it. It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out. If he was talking about burning out like Sid Vicious, forget it.....I worship the people who survive.

2011-08-06 23:10

PLAYBOY: You disagree with Neil Young's lyric in "Rust Never Sleeps": "It's better to burn out than to fade away..."
LENNON: I hate it. It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out. If he was talking about burning out like Sid Vicious, forget it.....I worship the people who survive.

LENNON: "Bless You" is again about Yoko. I think Mick Jagger took "Bless You" and turned it into "Miss You." [Singing] "Wherever you are, child on a shooting star." The engineer kept wanting me to speed that up--he said, "This is a hit song if you'd just do it fast." He was right. 'Cause as "Miss You" it turned into a hit. I like Mick's r...

2011-09-18 11:34

LENNON: "Bless You" is again about Yoko. I think Mick Jagger took "Bless You" and turned it into "Miss You." [Singing] "Wherever you are, child on a shooting star." The engineer kept wanting me to speed that up--he said, "This is a hit song if you'd just do it fast." He was right. 'Cause as "Miss You" it turned into a hit. I like Mick's record better. I have no ill feeling about it. I think it's a great Stones track, and I really love it. But I do hear that lick in it. Could be subconscious or conscious. It's irrelevant. Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it.

PLAYBOY: More songs. "Jealous Guy"?
LENNON: My song, melody written in India. The lyrics explain themselves clearly: I was a very jealous, possessiv guy. Toward everything. A very insecure male. A guy who wants to put his woman in a little box, lock her up, and just bring her out when he feels like playing with her. She's not allowed to communicate with the outside world--outside of me-...

2011-09-18 11:20

PLAYBOY: More songs. "Jealous Guy"?
LENNON: My song, melody written in India. The lyrics explain themselves clearly: I was a very jealous, possessiv guy. Toward everything. A very insecure male. A guy who wants to put his woman in a little box, lock her up, and just bring her out when he feels like playing with her. She's not allowed to communicate with the outside world--outside of me--because it makes me feel insecure.
PLAYBOY: You express even your most painful emotion publicly?
LENNON: I made the decision at sixteen or seventeen that what I did, I wanted everybody to see. I wasn't going after the aestheticism or the monastery or the lone artist who supposedly doesn't care what people think about his work. I care a lot whether people hate it or love it, because it's part of me and it hurts me when they hate it, or hate me, and it's very pleasing when they like it. But, as many public figures have said, "The praise is never enough, and the criticism always bites deep." That's just the predicament of being some,,,artist.

LENNON: I go to restaurants and the groups always play "Yesterday." Yoko and I even signed a guy's violin in Spain after he played us "Yesterday." He couldn't understant that I didn't write the song. But I guess he couldn't have gone from table to table playing "I Am The Warlus."

2011-08-06 22:53

LENNON: I go to restaurants and the groups always play "Yesterday." Yoko and I even signed a guy's violin in Spain after he played us "Yesterday." He couldn't understant that I didn't write the song. But I guess he couldn't have gone from table to table playing "I Am The Warlus."

PLAYBOY: You disagree with Neil Young's lyric in "Rust Never Sleeps": "It's better to burn out than to fade away..."
LENNON: I hate it. It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out. If he was talking about burning out like Sid Vicious, forget it.....I worship the people who survive.

2011-08-06 23:10

PLAYBOY: You disagree with Neil Young's lyric in "Rust Never Sleeps": "It's better to burn out than to fade away..."
LENNON: I hate it. It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out. If he was talking about burning out like Sid Vicious, forget it.....I worship the people who survive.

A regular at the coffeehouse came by the table so say hello. Yoko and John nodded politely as the gent discoursed briefly on the harmonic passages within "Norwegian Wood." When the old man left with a wave, John turned to me and said, "After all this time, I don't have any idea what the fuck a harmonic is.""

2011-08-06 23:34

A regular at the coffeehouse came by the table so say hello. Yoko and John nodded politely as the gent discoursed briefly on the harmonic passages within "Norwegian Wood." When the old man left with a wave, John turned to me and said, "After all this time, I don't have any idea what the fuck a harmonic is.""

(LENNON:) When he (Lennon's friend) saw him (Elvis) in Vegas, I asked my friend how he was. He said, "Well, if you sort of half shut your eyes and pretended, it was heaven."
(LENNON:) And for the ones who want to relive it, "Resurrect the Beatles" and all, for those who didn't understnad the Beatles and the Sixties in the first place, what the fuck are we going to do for them ...

2011-08-13 14:22

(LENNON:) When he (Lennon's friend) saw him (Elvis) in Vegas, I asked my friend how he was. He said, "Well, if you sort of half shut your eyes and pretended, it was heaven."

(LENNON:) And for the ones who want to relive it, "Resurrect the Beatles" and all, for those who didn't understnad the Beatles and the Sixties in the first place, what the fuck are we going to do for them now? ......Do we have to do the walking on water again because a whole pile of dummies didn't see it the first time or didn't believe it when they saw it?

LENNON: "Bless You" is again about Yoko. I think Mick Jagger took "Bless You" and turned it into "Miss You." [Singing] "Wherever you are, child on a shooting star." The engineer kept wanting me to speed that up--he said, "This is a hit song if you'd just do it fast." He was right. 'Cause as "Miss You" it turned into a hit. I like Mick's r...

2011-09-18 11:34

LENNON: "Bless You" is again about Yoko. I think Mick Jagger took "Bless You" and turned it into "Miss You." [Singing] "Wherever you are, child on a shooting star." The engineer kept wanting me to speed that up--he said, "This is a hit song if you'd just do it fast." He was right. 'Cause as "Miss You" it turned into a hit. I like Mick's record better. I have no ill feeling about it. I think it's a great Stones track, and I really love it. But I do hear that lick in it. Could be subconscious or conscious. It's irrelevant. Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it.

PLAYBOY: More songs. "Jealous Guy"?
LENNON: My song, melody written in India. The lyrics explain themselves clearly: I was a very jealous, possessiv guy. Toward everything. A very insecure male. A guy who wants to put his woman in a little box, lock her up, and just bring her out when he feels like playing with her. She's not allowed to communicate with the outside world--outside of me-...

2011-09-18 11:20

PLAYBOY: More songs. "Jealous Guy"?
LENNON: My song, melody written in India. The lyrics explain themselves clearly: I was a very jealous, possessiv guy. Toward everything. A very insecure male. A guy who wants to put his woman in a little box, lock her up, and just bring her out when he feels like playing with her. She's not allowed to communicate with the outside world--outside of me--because it makes me feel insecure.
PLAYBOY: You express even your most painful emotion publicly?
LENNON: I made the decision at sixteen or seventeen that what I did, I wanted everybody to see. I wasn't going after the aestheticism or the monastery or the lone artist who supposedly doesn't care what people think about his work. I care a lot whether people hate it or love it, because it's part of me and it hurts me when they hate it, or hate me, and it's very pleasing when they like it. But, as many public figures have said, "The praise is never enough, and the criticism always bites deep." That's just the predicament of being some,,,artist.

PLAYBOY: "Get Back"?
LENNON: "Get Back" is Paul/ That's a better version of "Lady Madonna." You know, a potboiler rewrite.
PLAYBOY: That one is a real story, though, isn't it?
LENNON: No, I think there's some underlying thing about Yoko in there.
PLAYBOY: Really?
LENNON: You know, "Get back to where you once belonged." Every time he sang the line in the...

2011-09-18 11:13

PLAYBOY: "Get Back"?
LENNON: "Get Back" is Paul/ That's a better version of "Lady Madonna." You know, a potboiler rewrite.
PLAYBOY: That one is a real story, though, isn't it?
LENNON: No, I think there's some underlying thing about Yoko in there.
PLAYBOY: Really?
LENNON: You know, "Get back to where you once belonged." Every time he sang the line in the studio, he'd look at Yoko.
PLAYBOY: Are you kidding?
LENNON: No. But maybe he'll say I'm paranoid. You know, he can say, "I'm a normal family man, those two are freaks." That'll leave him a chance to say that one.